


Forging Fate

by OriginalImpossibleSouffleGirl



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: Alternate History, Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Gen, There Is No Canon Only Zuul
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-14
Updated: 2018-08-14
Packaged: 2019-06-27 12:51:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15685800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OriginalImpossibleSouffleGirl/pseuds/OriginalImpossibleSouffleGirl
Summary: The First Witness awakens in a brave new world.





	Forging Fate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [irishlullaby13](https://archiveofourown.org/users/irishlullaby13/gifts), [Majestrix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Majestrix/gifts).



> Here's the role reversal fic you never knew you needed (and kinda don't really need, but I wrote it, so...)! Will update ratings and tags as I go.

_October, 1781_

Abigail Mills glanced behind her as she fled the environs of the village of Johnstown. Colonel Marinus Willet’s militia was in pursuit of the raiding British Loyalists and the Mohawk, and it seemed they were soon to catch them. She spared a quick look up into the sky, noting the sun’s position. Unless she missed her guess, the militia would catch the raiders by noon. Pray god it happened before the damned Redcoats reached the village.

In any case, her work here was done, and it was time to return to her post in Sleepy Hollow to await further instructions--after informing Governor Clinton of the happenings at Currytown and Johnstown, of course. Perhaps she could secure from him a promise of reinforcements for Colonel Willet, too. The Redcoats, bolstered by the Mohawk warriors, far outnumbered the Patriot militia. Abbie sent a silent prayer upwards that the Colonel have a few tricks up his tactical sleeve or else the battle was lost before it was ever engaged, and reinforcements would arrive to find nothing but rubble and smug lobsterbacks.

Abbie pushed her horse, who obliged her by increasing her gallop. At her current pace, she could reach Sleepy Hollow by early evening.

_Pray it is not too late,_ she thought as she set her lips in a grim line.

It was days like these she cursed her involvement in General Washington’s army. It afforded her some security, to be sure, but even after her years of service she could never quite be comfortable with the loss of life. Even the suggestion of it set her ill at ease. Still, it was a better position than most of her skinfolk found themselves in. As a part of General Washington’s Culper Ring, she was afforded access the average freedman would not have, as well as the General’s own protection.

She wrinkled her nose at the thought of Washington. As her protector, she paid him the respect he was due, but her distaste for the man himself--and his slave owning--was becoming increasingly hard to conceal. Made worse by the fact that Washington seemed to esteem Abbie, and her foster mother Grace Dixon, highly.

How could a man simultaneously believe a people’s worth to be so far beneath his own, yet place his entire life and the success of his very nation in the hands of the same?

Perhaps Abbie should do as Grace frequently cautioned and just do her duty without the complication of such philosophical quandaries.

_But how can I?_ Abbie asked herself. _How can I fight for this country’s freedom and ignore the fight for my own people’s?_

She chuckled, then eased up on the reins of her horse as the terrain got rougher, imagining what Grace would say. She’d probably blame Abbie’s progressive views on Benjamin Franklin, and she wouldn’t be far wrong. Her mentor had frequently subjected her to various lectures on the rights of man, and the evils of slavery. Perhaps she could convince him to be more overt with his views. His word held so much more weight than her own, and he was just as respected as General Washington--if not more so.

_But there would be time for all that_ , Abbie told herself as she leaned over her mare and patted her encouragingly. _First, there was a village to save_.

  


* * *

 

 

At the outskirts of Sleepy Hollow, Abbie finally allowed herself to relax. She had been driving her poor horse hard, and she was relieved to see that in a few minutes’ time she would be safely ensconced in her room at Frederick’s Manor with a cup of Grace’s chamomile tea in her hands.

She was smiling at the soothing fantasy when a rider thundered up behind her. She felt the whoosh of an edged weapon ruffle her hair and she ducked with a startled sound, spurring her mare back into a gallop while glancing back for a look at her attacker. The rider pulled up on her right, grabbing her with his left hand but it was not the punishing grasp that made Abbie gasp in fright and draw back.

The Rider had no face. Or at least, not a _human_ face. In its place was a frightening blank mask that caused her to recoil, leaving her off-balance as her frightened horse reared. The Rider took advantage and swung his weapon again--an axe with a glowing edge, she now saw--and Abbie tumbled painfully to the ground.

She regained her feet moments before the Rider wheeled back around and bore down on her, and she hurriedly drew her pistol, firing with a speed and accuracy that belied her lack of balance. She managed to hit the Rider at center mass, and to her surprise, it almost unseated him. He faltered and his horse reared, plumes of smoke blowing from its nostrils and eyes glowing red.

Abbie decided not to reload her pistol, choosing instead to holster it and grimly draw her sword. All men had weaknesses. Even those without faces. She meant to find and exploit his.

The Rider had dismounted, choosing to face her on the ground, and oh, Lord, his sheer size almost made her break her ready stance. He was tall, so tall, made even more so by the blankness of his mask and--she noted as he moved within striking range--his eyes.

“What foul demon be you?” she shouted.

He didn’t answer, choosing instead to swing at her with the axe. She ducked and came up also swinging, catching his sleeve in a deadly slice. She dodged as he lumbered onward before catching himself and turning back toward her.

Abbie sucked in a breath. Just what in the Heavens would it take to fell this creature? A normal man would have been dead at least twice by now!

He paused as if surprised she’d managed to wound him, then advanced on her. Abbie knew that if he managed to get past her sword she wouldn’t be able to hold her own against him, so with one last, desperate slash, she cut off the Rider’s head right as he crossed the threshold.

It was so sudden, that it caught him at precisely the moment he sliced at her, and Abbie was elated when she saw his head roll off, coming to a stop against a tree, white eyes still staring directly at her.

 It was only when she fell to her knees, swaying dizzily, that she realized the burning sensation in her chest was not pride at a battle well-fought and hard-won, but a gaping wound bleeding freely.

The Rider had struck true.

 

* * *

  


_“We don't have much time.”_

Abbie groaned as she tried to open her eyes. All she could see were the spectral shadows of two people. She immediately recognized the voice of Reverend Knapp. Here to administer her last rites?

She tried to speak, tried to ask if she had slain the Rider. But it came out as naught more than strained moans. Suddenly her vision became clear for a moment and she saw the face of Grace Dixon looming over her.

“Stay strong, Abigail.”

Her vision clouded again.

“ _She's taken a fever, Reverend. We don't have much longer until it's too late.”_

The last things she heard before succumbing to the darkness were the voices of Grace and Reverend Knapp beginning to chant in Latin followed by a piercing ring in her ears.

The moment replayed over and over in Abbie's mind, ending with the darkness and the ringing in her mind growing louder. Then… a stillness.

 

* * *

 

 

_October, 2013_

 

An unfamiliar voice whispered a similar chant and Abbie sucked in a deep breath as her arms lashed out. She met resistance and realized she was covered with dirt.

Had she been mistakenly buried alive?

Panic seized her and pulsed through her veins as she frantically tried to free herself from the soil compacted around her. Her eyes were burning with tears when her fingers felt cool wet air.

_Almost there. Almost there!_

Abbie broke through the ground and gasped for breath, her eyes wide.

Her lungs burned as she frantically took in her surroundings, noting almost absently the jars of strange tinctures and long-extinguished candles and censers.

She climbed out of her ostensible grave, trying hard to corral her wild thoughts into the rationality those who knew her admired in her.

_Where am I?_

_Where is Grace?_

_Was Johnstown saved?_

_Was the Rider dead?_

The Rider. The thought finally settled her thoughts, and she looked about for a weapon. She’d cut off his head, but he’d survived being shot, and she wasn’t entirely convinced he was fully human.

Abbie winced and rubbed her chest, the remembered pain of his blow aching dully.

Surprised to find a fully healed wound above her breasts, she looked down and studied it. Her borrowed shirt gaped at the neck, exposing the wound and a glimpse of her corset.

The wound was fatal. How had she survived it? How long had it taken? She was no longer confused by being buried alive. She would have assumed the same, circumstances considered.

Well. No answers would come to her in this dank cave. She gave up looking for a suitable weapon and stepped out. The cheery sunlight peeked at her through trees, striking her with incongruity. Surely rising from the grave called for gloomy, damp weather?

She made her way across a small waterfall and through the forest, slightly disoriented by the unfamiliarity of the area. She was further disoriented when she came to what seemed like a solid river of black.

Her boots thudded on it, and she bent to examine the ground. Smoother than cobblestone, yet hard as such.

Suddenly, a screech startled her and she straightened to see a contraption barreling toward her.

“No!” The exclamation burst from her lips at the same time as the contraption swerved to avoid her and its...operator...shouted at her to “get the fuck out of the road!”

Abbie indignantly rose up to give the vulgar man a lesson on proper ways to address a lady, but he--and the contraption--were gone as if they never were, the only evidence of their passing a lingering haze of smoke.

She turned to look as she heard the same screech that heralded the other contraption, and this time she jumped back as another contraption sped past her, almost clipping her side.

This time the operator said nothing but “sorry, lady!”

Abbie took a second to take a deep breath, then figured she’d follow in the wake of the contraptions, as they were the only evidence there would be more people nearby.

She followed them, realizing grimly that perhaps she’d awoken in a world no longer familiar. As she passed a sign that bafflingly pronounced the nearby town as Sleepy Hollow, with a population of 144,000--a number that seemed absurdly high--she hoped she could avoid the danger that dogged her steps as surely as the sun rose in the east.

**Author's Note:**

> I would like to formally thank--as always--my peeps irishlullaby13 and Majestrix for all the prodding, poking, encouragement, tough love, editing, exasperation, sinning, and general support. Good looks. 
> 
> And of course, those lovely lovely souls who keep reading my work. I notice you, and I love you. Thanks for sticking with me.
> 
> Now, fun totally unnecessary stuff:
> 
> Colonel Willet was a real guy and the Battle of Johnstown was a thing that happened. You can read about them [here](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Marinus_Willett) and [here](https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Battle_of_Johnstown). Yay, book learnin'!


End file.
